Death Among the Dunes: Desert Monsters

With their punishing climate and near-total lack of precious water, deserts are one of the most hostile environments in existence. Those who spend enough time among the desert sands know that some monsters can thrive even in these hellish wastes. Such creatures are feared and respected by wise adventurers, for they are invariably predatory and deadly—a consequence of evolving in a place where the most reliable source of life-giving water is a fresh corpse.

Blood Snake

Those who travel the desert sands sometimes witness the unsettling sight of small patches of dune moving of their own accord. The wise among these travelers give such patches a wide berth, for they know that these are no mere oddities of the desert landscape, but signs of a deadly predator known as the blood snake.

A red-scaled reptile 20 feet long and as thick around as a human’s arm, the blood snake is well-adapted to its desert home. Its hide is tough enough to repel attacks from smaller predators, and it’s very resistant to both the venom of other predators and the desert heat.

The blood snake is a master hunter in its own right, using a combination of stealth and brute force to catch and consume its prey. It burrows into the desert sand and moves through it as easily as it moves aboveground, and its bite delivers a potent neurotoxin that renders its prey completely paralyzed. The snake then quickly chews its way into the paralyzed victim through the stomach and makes its way to the heart, which it consumes in one bite.

Blood Snake Tactics

A blood snake always starts its attack while hidden by using sandswallow, relying on the element of surprise to deliver the first bite attack. After its victim is paralyzed, the snake delivers coup de grace bite attacks until it consumes the victim’s heart, which occurs with the attack that kills the victim.